All of you who ever got teased and tormented during your school years, all of you who were ever the butt of a joke, all of you who found going to school an absolute hell at times know what I mean, and the rest of you who don't - well, shut up. What do you know?
As I said, to some extent it was a blessing. I focused on the stuff that was important because I never got stuff handed on a silver platter, and it was a good training. I look at many of the cool kids now and see what has become of them, and frankly, I'd rather be dead than trade with them. I am at peace with who I am, and I can say I have always done what I really wanted because I didn't have this stupid high school type social monkey business to distract me.
You know, the funny thing is sometimes to see who else is on that list of people that got bullied a lot in their lives. Sometimes it's people you would never expect to see there... and I have to say, a lot, if not most of my friends, are in that group.
One person that I was absolutely surprised to see in that group was Wil Wheaton. You'd think that famous people have it easy, but that poor chap got his butt kicked a lot throughout his life.
And like most of us, he is trying to learn his lessons and go on with life, and struggling with it, and it makes him wonderfully human. I guess that is what I have always liked most about him... that he is so human, and such a warm spirit.
Anyways, today he blogged something that I found totally inspiring, and it is soul candy for all of us geeks who ever had to struggle with bullies and malicious tongues.
"While I watched the dogs run around, I marked how lucky and happy I am. "I
have fantstic kids. I have a wife who loves me as much as I love her, and I was
able to spend my Monday morning at the park with my dogs. I've got the freedom
to write what I want, when I want, and I have the privilege of sharing these
things with a wonderful audience who choose to give me a little bit of their
time.
So fuck what some jackasssays, who doesn't know me, and who didn't make
an effort to find out what I or my book was about. Yeah, the truth is important
to me, but just like I can't please everyone, I also can't expect everyone to
live an honest and honorable life, either. The world is filled with jerks, and
probability just says that sooner or later I'm going to run into one of
them.
If I spend all sorts of time dwelling on one person who was an idiot,
it's disrespectful to all the thousands of people who have been kind . . . not
to mention a huge waste of energy. ......
I know that it's risky to be totally honest, because some people view that as weakness, and attack. But the unexamined life is not worth living, right? If I'm not totally honest with myself, how will I ever learn and grow? Should I stop examining my life now, because I wrote a book about it?Well, right now I need to examine my life, and I need to be totally honest with myself. I have to own up to something: I *did* hope that my book would get noticed by the Industry. I hoped that it would get noticed by critics, and I hoped that The Media would pay attention . . . but all that happened after it was published. When I wrote it, I hoped that my story would be amusing, interesting, and maybe even inspiring to people.
And you know what? That's exactly what Real People tell me when they read my book: they were amused, interested, and occasionaly inspired.What a myopic fucking fool I've been! What a stupid, stupid jerkass! I
was so worried about impressing The Cool Kids, I forgot who I am, and why I do
this. And even worse, I disrespected -- even if unintentionally -- the very
people who have been with me on The Journey all along. It's not some stupid
magazine that owes *me* an apology; it's *me* who owes all those Real People an apology."Cheers for that, Wil! You rock! :D *fan girl*
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